Wentworth Falls cottage

Looking to add light and warmth to your home? Combining vintage items and bold colours this family has added light and warmth to their cottage home.

Even on the gloomiest of days — when the wind whips through the trees and dark clouds unleash hail — Jane and Michael Frosh’s home in the NSW Blue Mountains has an air of brightness. Perhaps it’s the lollipop-pink letterbox and matching front door, or the handmade fabric bunting that flutters between posts on the old timber verandah. Most likely it’s Jane herself, who strolls out into the weather, children and dogs bounding at her heels, her welcoming smile framed by the brightest of lipsticks.

Jane, a stylist and director of an events management company, and her husband Michael, a landscape designer, left Sydney two years ago seeking more space and a healthier lifestyle for their three children — Scarlett, seven, Jasper, five, and Rafferty, three.

When they reached Wentworth Falls — loved by locals for its tree-lined streets and artistic leanings — the turn-of-the-century weatherboard cottage was the first and only property the couple looked at. “We walked in and thought, ‘Yeah, we can see ourselves living here’,” Jane says.

However, it was a different story the weekend they moved, when the mountains turned on a decidedly frosty welcome. “It snowed!” Jane recalls. “Part of me thought, ‘What have I done?’” The children, too, were uncertain at first. The half-hectare block, with a grove of heirloom fruit trees and thick clumps of agapanthus and wild iris, seemed frighteningly large: “We ended up making them a small backyard within the backyard just so they’d go outside.”

Since then, the kids have conquered every corner. Michael built a tree house that doubles as a pirate ship, and many a picnic there requires fighting off noisy cockatoos who swarm in for a sneaky feed.

Nearby lies more treasure — boxed garden plots (also built by Michael) planted with herbs, salad greens and other vegetables. The family tend the plots together and delight in the harvest, which already this morning has seen Jane make orange zest cake and pumpkin soup. “This is new to me,” she says of her kitchen garden, partly shaded by orange, lemon, apple and cherry trees. “I’m not that good at cooking, but I really like it. It’s cool to be able to pick stuff you’ve grown — you get a sense of accomplishment.”

The garden has also helped Jane forge new friendships. She’s part of a network that leaves eggs, fruit and vegetables on each other’s doorsteps and in summer the family hold outdoor film nights for their neighbours.

Michael and Jane still commute to Sydney — Michael five days a week, Jane on Fridays — but weekends are generally spent around the house. Soon after moving in, they freshened the interiors with paint, new carpet and light fittings, made shutters for the kids’ bedroom windows and began looking for furniture to fit their new lifestyle.

“I’ve had to be a little more flexible and fluid with this space,” Jane says. “You can’t keep a pristine house with dogs, chickens, kids and nine sets of French doors! Our space now is typically ‘vintage industrial’ and it really just represents a sense of adventure — our adventure.”

Jane finds furniture at auctions, vintage shops, on eBay — and on the side of the road. “There’s a hard rubbish pick-up here once a year,” she says. “Jasper loves it — we drive around and find things.” Recently they stumbled across a pair of butterfly chair frames, which Jane wrestled into the car and has since fitted with cowhide covers.“You’ve got to be prepared to fix things up,” she says of this commitment to recycling. “Most just need a bit of sanding, some nails or some paint. Others you can transform — the sparrow painting in Scarlett’s room used to be an old real estate sign while the desk in the office was, until a few weeks ago, a Chinese screen.”

Each space, including Jane and Michael’s upstairs bedroom and the breezeway with its Moroccan daybed and ornate birdcage, contains pieces that are whimsical and fun. “As a stylist I love to play with colours, proportions, scale and texture — why not do that at home?” Jane says. This, too, is why this house has a brightness that transcends the weather.

About the house

As soon as they moved in, Jane and Michael started painting. The main living area was coated a gentle blue-grey shade, Dulux Peplum; in the spacious breezeway, Jane chose dark and moody Dulux Domino. The exterior of the house is just as dark — it’s painted in Taubmans Black Fox, contrasting with the front door and letterbox in British Paints French Pink.

In the children’s rooms, Jane and Michael painted over bright blue and yellow walls, opting for a soothing olive-grey shade — Taubmans Camel Cord. They also laid sisal carpets and made window shutters out of old doors.

Jane describes her style as ‘vintage industrial’, and gravitates towards salvaged or recycled pieces: “Objects that the kids love to touch, carry around and hear the history of are much more interesting than mass-produced, soulless ones.”

Online auction site eBay is a favourite shopping destination: that’s where Jane found the dining table, side cabinet and floral armchair in the living room.

“You can’t keep a pristine house with dogs, chickens, kids and nine sets of French doors!”

Clipboards on the wall in Jane’s office are continually updated. Her desk is an old Chinese screen mounted on trestle legs.

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